Manman-ji, Buddhist temple near Mabashi Station, Japan.
Manman-ji is a Rinzai Zen temple in Mabashi, Matsudo, Chiba Prefecture, with a mountain name of Hōō-zan and Amida Nyōrai as its main image. Its grounds hold a main hall completed in 1987, a bell tower, a Mizuko Jizō and a Fudō hall, and a gate housing the guardian kings. The temple stands about five minutes on foot from Mabashi Station.
Chiba Yoritane founded the temple in 1256 as Dainichi-ji, a Shingon temple in what is now Inage-ku, Chiba, with the prelate Ninshō. In the Muromachi period Chiba Mitsutane (1360–1426) converted it to the Rinzai school and renamed it Manman-ji, taking one kanji from Ashikaga Ujimitsu. Between 1532 and 1555 Takagi Tanetatsu invited the priest Kinho from Daitoku-ji in Kyoto, and the temple was relocated to its present site in 1537. A fire destroyed most of it in 1908; the Hondō was rebuilt in 1987.
The temple is known for the "Nio-sama no matakuguri" — passing between the two Nio guardian figures. The statues are attributed by temple tradition to Unkei, though the actual sculptor is unknown. The temple's name was taken from Ashikaga Ujimitsu, the Kamakura kubō, during its Muromachi-period revival. Annual events for parishioners include a goma offering on Coming of Age Day in January and a segaki memorial on 16 August.
Manman-ji is about a five-minute walk from Mabashi Station on the JR Jōban Line and the Ryūtetsu Nagareyama Line. From the Keisei Matsudo Line, take the Matsudo Shin-Keisei bus to the Mabashi Station entrance stop. The temple's proximity to the railway caused the 1908 fire, when sparks from a train set the buildings alight.
The temple is known for the "Nio-sama no matakuguri," a practice of crawling between the legs of the guardian statues. The pair of wooden Kongo-rikishi stands is the oldest surviving set of Nio statues in the Kanto region and was designated an Important Cultural Property in 1916 under the former Ancient Temples and Shrines Preservation Law.
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